Friday, January 28, 2005

In two days, Iraq is going to try and vote in the first step toward the hoped for establishment of a constitutional democracy and in a stepped-up campaign of terror and bloodshed, the enemies of democracy, freedom and America have cranked up the attacks on our soldiers and the people of Iraq.

I speak, of course, of multi-millionaire elitist thug Senators John F. (for fraud) Kerry and his mentor, the corpulent mistress killer, Teddy Kennedy.

On Sunday, Tim Russert is going to host the losing gold-digging Feckless Crapweasel for his first interview since getting his silk-clad ass kicked despite being up against a president who was ripe for the taking with all the bad news that had been reported - not that it was actually true, but whatever - so he can presumably moan about how everything was totally awful and how his masters at the UN are disappointed that their oil-for-food scam has been busted and....

Whoops, sorry. Started dreaming there.

But, he most certainly will drone on in that zombie funeral director monotone of his about how terrible things are in Iraq at the same moment Iraq citizens are risking their lives to participate in their destiny. Nice.

Even (and ever) worse is Teddy Kennedy's outburst the other day in which he vomited (along with a fifth of 5-o'Clock vodka) his tired litany of lies and fury about "George Bush's Vietnam" (ironic choice considering his bro started that little adventure) and demanding that the anti-democracy insurgents be rewarded by our cutting and running, effectively making the loss of American life a total waste and allowing their most dire predictions to become self-fulfilling.

Note: One of the thing's that started my march away from my past votes of convenience for the Stupid Party was Dubya's cuddling up to the only Kennedy boy not worth a bullet to anyone and allowing him to co-write the disgusting No Child Left Behind thing which promptly became a club used against him. In addition to the NCLB backstab, Fat Teddy continually provided aid and comfort to our enemies by undermining public support for seeing the post-war period though and by extension encouraging the slaughter of our forces and innocents in order to have a CAMPAIGN ISSUE. If you're a war widow, you can thank Teddy and his sidekick Michael Moore. (They're rich and your husband is dead. Hoowah!)

Back to Negative Ted - why is he making such a stink NOW instead of waiting a few days for something bad to happen that would justify all the naysaying? Ya got me. Maybe he knows something? Why not? The Democratics anti-democracy antics in Washington and Wisconsin to steal elections are akin to Zaqarwi's statements that Al Queda is at war against democracy, so why shouldn't they be sharing info when their shared goals are to destroy America and install themselves as some sort of holy dictatators.

On Hardball, Weds. night, an L.A. Times reporter actually made the mistake of speaking some truth (hat tip The Corner) to the blustery Chris Matthews when he said:

"I spoke to a Marine, a young Marine captain. He made a very good point. He said, this is not Vietnam. The insurgency here has no philosophy to speak of. This isn`t a philosophy like the Viet Cong that had communism, that had a national leader, Ho Chi Minh, that they adored. The insurgents basically have no philosophy, except no government, no control, no self-determination.

So it`s hard to think of them as some sort of legitimate party in that regard. They`re essentially -- in Ramadi, certainly, you could liken them to the Mafioso, who would really like to control, if not the whole city, certain neighborhoods and continue doing so.

Remember, this is a city that not even Saddam Hussein could control. They took over the government center from the Saddam Hussein government while he was in power. This is a very, very tough city as part of a tough province, the Al Anbar Province. There`s no philosophy here. There`s violence."

Saddam Hussein, the Butcher of Baghdad, couldn't control Ramadi, but we're the bad guys for not bringing them to heel? Ho-kay....

Also note that during the campaign last year and even now, the Dems have been harping how we didn't have enough troops on the ground to "win the peace" and how stupid Dubya is, but now that the Iraq election is about to occur - despite the calls of the media to postpone it to allow for more soldiers to die - they're suddenly flip-flopped and demanding that we CUT force levels. Nice trick, eh?

Bottom line: Reasonable people want this mess over with ASAFP, but aren't gonna try and sabotage it for partisan gain. The K Twins are all about the sellout of their country.

If a battle ends with Americans killing a hundred guerrillas and terrorists, while sustaining 10 fatalities, that is an American victory. But not in the mainstream media. The headline is more likely to read: "Ten More Americans Killed in Iraq."

This kind of journalism can turn victory into defeat. Kept up long enough, it can even end up with real defeat, when support for the war collapses at home and abroad.

One of the biggest American victories during World War II was called "the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot" because American fighter pilots shot down more than 340 Japanese planes over the Mariana Islands while losing just 30 American planes. But what if our current reporting practices had been used back then? The story, as printed and broadcast, could have been: "Today, 18 American pilots were killed and five more severely wounded as the Japanese blasted more than two dozen American planes out of the sky." A steady diet of that kind of one-sided reporting and our whole war effort against Japan might have collapsed.

Whether the one-sided reporting of the war in Vietnam was a factor in the American defeat there used to be a matter of controversy. But in recent years, high officials of the Communist government of Vietnam have admitted that they lost the war on the battlefields but won it in the U.S. media and on the streets of America, where political pressures from the anti-war movement threw away the victory for which thousands of American lives had been sacrificed.

Too many in the media today regard the reporting of the Vietnam War as one of their greatest triumphs. It certainly showed the power of the media - but also its irresponsibility. Some in the media today seem determined to recapture those glory days by the way they report on events in the Iraq war.

Sowell is right, but he leaves one important issue unaddressed. Why is it that the mainstream media can justify their relentless negativity and their single-minded focus on American casualties? After all, journalists are well aware that terrorists are being killed too, and that much progress is being made on various fronts.

But these things do not deter the MSM, for a very simple reason: with very few exceptions, they do not respect the mission in Iraq. They take it as an article of faith that the war was a mistake; that the purported absence of WMDs in Iraq (not true, but close enough for the purpose) means that there can be no good justification for the conflict; and that all casualties are, therefore, a waste.

If you really believe that the Iraq war is being fought for nothing, and is not an integral part of the war on terror, then this logic is compelling. There is nothing to report but mounting casualties. Defeating the enemy is immaterial--indeed, in many quarters it is an article of faith that our presence in Iraq creates enemies rather than destroying them--and any progress being made in rebuilding infrastructure, opening schools, etc., is chimerical. I think that helps to explain why most MSM outlets are so oblivious to repeated complaints that they aren't telling the whole story.

In the run-up to it's wide release, the new Clint Eastwood-Hillary Swank chick boxing flick "Million Dollar Baby" has been widely hailed as one of the best movies of 2004 and racked up a slew of big Oscars nominations.

One feature of nearly every review has been a mention that there's some sort of huge plot twist about 2/3rds of the way thru but, of course, it wasn't revealed, though I've always though that even warning of a twist is almost as bad as giving it away cuz you'll be sitting there the whole time waiting for something to happen.

However, in the last week, several sites and columnists have either mentioned what the movie is ultimately about (by their reckoning) and some widely-read articles have flat out given away the whole darn story. I'm not going to repeat the details here - you can Google if you want to - but I suspect a serious Culture War skirmish is going to break out over this movie, making it impossible to avoid discovery and discussion.

Suffice to say, if you're looking for a scrappy, underdog, "Rocky in a sports bra" type of heart-warming movie, you're gonna be sorely surprised by what occurs and what the story seems to be saying about life.

I'm really troubled by what I've read about it, but I'm reserving comment until it either breaks out publicly or I see it, which became less likely (though I did want to before) after the spoilers and the qualms became known.

"No Child Left Behind says all kids must reach high standards," Newman said. "It’s our responsibility to find as many ways as possible to accomplish this."

The administrators agreed, Newman said, that a spelling bee doesn’t meet the criteria of all children reaching high standards -- because there can only be one winner, leaving all other students behind.

"It’s about one kid winning, several making it to the top and leaving all others behind. That’s contrary to No Child Left Behind," Newman said.

A spelling bee, she continued, is about "some kids being winners, some kids being losers."

As a result, the spelling bee "sends a message that this isn’t an all-kids movement," Newman said.

Furthermore, professional organizations now frown on competition at the elementary school level and are urging participation in activities that avoid winners, Newman said. That’s why there are no sports teams at the elementary level, she said as an example.

The emphasis today, she said, is on building self-esteem in all students.

"You have to build positive self-esteem for all kids, so they believe they’re all winners," she said. "You want to build positive self-esteem so that all kids can get to where they want to go."

A spelling bee only benefits a few, not all, students, the elementary principals and Newman agreed, so it was canceled.

The poster added: A local anchorwoman has some common sense, commenting: Winning a spelling bee..."just meant you were a good speller."

Someone should forward this story to Al Queda to show that they can just call off the jihad because we're doing a perfectly good job in destroying ourselves already.

If any of you are sports fans, how would you feel if the Super Bowl were cancelled so that one team of steroid-engorged millionaires wouldn't feel bad about themselves? All you Boston readers - have you considered the feelings of New Yorkers? For shame!

I wonder what's behind this drive to pasteurize out the desire to prosper in or children? Where's the next Thomas Edison or Steve Jobs going to come from if no one wants to innovate because there's no reward, either financially or spiritually?

I'm guessing that the Rhode Island schools aren't assigning Kurt Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron" which depicts a future (now?) in which everyone is made equal by crippling the above-average to bring them in line with the lowest common denominator. That would be too ironic.

Do a Google for their site - what, you think I'm the Federal Government and I should do everything for you? - but this outfit that runs the "anti-Oscars" made a big omission in their nominations for Worst Picture. Nominated were:

Alexander

Catwoman

Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2

Surviving Christmas

White Chicks

Of these list, I've only seen Catwoman and I don't get all the hate against it. Yeah, it's not particularly good and it totally throws away the Batman origins of the character, but it's got some OK fun and Halle Berry looks fine in this ridiculous getup.

How it gets included in such poor company when THE Cinematic War Crime of 2004...

VAN HELSING!!!

...gets left off every Worst Pix that I've seen is just crazy! I honestly suspect that somehow the trauma of VH was so profound, it was erased from the collective memory of the human race.

Thursday, January 27, 2005

When is the public gonna start opposing the government's constant thirst for more and more of their money? As detailed here, states are looking to fund their socialist schemes by taxing elective surgeries.

"This is an unfair tax on women," said Haeck, editor of Plastic Surgery News. "The bulk of the people who have procedures are not financially upper-class women. They've saved hard, and this is about restoring their self-esteem."

Of course, this will punish those who support Big Government the most thru their consistant voting for Democrats. Ironic, no?

Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Led by former (but unrepented?) Ku Klux Klan recruiter and champion tax guzzler Robert Byrd, a parade of noble multi-millionaire Democratic Senators took turns yesterday making an example of SecState nominee Condi Rice for being a race traitor to the liberal-black hegemony the Left believes is the natural order of things.

Even though there was no chance of derailing her nomination, they delayed her confirmation so that they could make a great show of their fat white asses putting that sellout Aunt Jemima in her place so that any blacks who saw this character lynching would take the lesson that crossing the racist White Facsist Donkey Party was a figurative death sentence.

Anyhoo, a more polite explaination for this kangaroo court treatment - soon to be repeated on the Hispanic AG nominee Alberto Gonzales (why do Dems hate their core voters so blatantly and why do minorities continue to support them?) - is provided by Jim Geraghty over at NRO's TKS blog in the piece "FINDING SOLUTIONS IS HARD, BUT RIPPING RICE IS EASY". Here's the whole thing:

Why are so many Senate Democrats trying to out-denounce each other on the nomination of Condi Rice?

Fundraising? Well, yes.

Because they actually believe that she lied? Well, yes, even though to think that, one would have to believe that President Bush and his advisers knew we would not find stockpiles of WMDs, and wanted to have egg on their face heading into a reelection campaign out of some mysterious self-destructive motive. Apparently the president’s reelection prospects after the midterm elections looked too good, and Condi, Rove and the gang felt the need to give the Democrats a big, easy issue to attack the president with.

But mostly, Democrat after Democrat will take to the Senate floor to call Rice a liar and worse… because it’s easy.

In a few days, the Iraqis will have an election. We all hope this development hurts the insurgency, but it doesn’t seem likely that Abu Zarqawi is going to fold up shop and quit. A tough job remains.

And the Democrats… just don’t have many serious ideas to offer to deal with this problem.

During the campaign, Kerry’s Iraq policy essentially was, “I’ll do everything the Bush administration is doing but better, faster, more effectively… and I’ll get France and Germany to help.” Other than a pledge that his diplomatic skills could bring about a stunning reversal on the part of Old Europe, and generic comments of “do more faster,” Kerry couldn’t come up with many specific proposals that were significantly different than what we are doing now.

Coming up with plausible new solutions? That’s hard. But re-hashing the debates that preceded March 2003, and declaring “Bush and Condi LIIIIIEEED!!!” is easy.

Democrats could propose a radical new course – such as pulling the troops out now. But they know that idea is a political nonstarter. So with no specifics and no different ideas… what does a Democratic senator say on the most pressing foreign policy issue of the day?

“Condi lied.” And they say it over, and over, and over again.

He omits that in addition to the endemic racism of the Left, they also harbor the same anti-American, anti-democracy, pro-totalitarian views of Al Queda and have been acting in an endless act of treason to undercut our country in service of those who would destroy us, but presumably spare them.

Multiply Baltar from "Battlestar Galactica" by several magnitudes of number and you can see just how dire the threat from within is.

Dubya has said that he planned to attack the Social Security time bomb and the Dems and their lackeys in the MSM have fired up their Big Lie machines and are starting to saturate the airwaves and broadsheets with polls, spin and a general FUD campaign to derail his efforts. (They oppose him on everything else, so why start cooperating now?)

One front of this Big Lie jihad is to accuse Dubya of calling SocSec a "crisis" to frighten people into supporting reform. Of course, this is rank hypocrisy from the Party that had their President operating for eight years on the premise that every problem was a crisis that demanded a large socialist takeover by the Feds. Clinton called SocSec a ticking time bomb, just as he had said Iraq was a threat due to WMDs, but not that the Facist Donkey Party isn't in control, suddenly everything they said before is now lies and fear coming from Team Dubya.

Yeah, right.

Another Big Lie about the Left is that they support "choice". Now, the only "choice" they actually support is abortion 24/7 - sorry, but ya gotta call a shovel a shovel, folks, but that's another topic for another time - because when the concept of letting people have any choice in how THEIR MONEY is supposedly allocated for their retirement, it's "Whoa, Nelly! Hold the phone!" time and and they demand that people only have ONE choice and that's to remain enslaved to the government system that they control and rob to fund their socialist vote buying schemes.

For a taste of just how hard you're going to get f*cked without reform, scope out the Social Security Calculator that the Heritage Foundation has put up. Be sure to modify the defaults to reflect your personal circumstances and realize these are merely generalizations, but when I did it, I see that TWO-THIRDS of my potential return on my Social Security taxes is going up in smoke and that's IF they don't rework the payouts by fiat when they realize the scam has played out.

You can go to Starbuck's and order coffee in a hundred different ways; you can shuffle 10,000 songs in your iPod in exactly the order you want; buying a car offers countless options; even when you vote, if you don't like the Coke or Pepsi parties, you can always toss your vote to the RC Cola party out of spite, but when it comes to that 13.4% of YOUR money that's being mugged from your paycheck every couple of weeks, you only get ONE CHOICE if the Left has its druthers and when there's only one item to choose from, then you don't have a choice at all, do you?

Sure you can invest what's left after Uncle Sam robs you into IRAs and other investments to attempt to make up what you know damn well the government has no intention of paying you, but why do so many people accept this setup? Why don't they want control of their own money? If someone snatched their wallet in the grocery store parking lot on their way in and yelled over their shoulder, "You've still got money in your checking account - use that money to buy food.", they wouldn't feel to happy about that, but they follow like good drones to the drumbeat of the Left when told they can't invest their own money in accounts that THEY control.

Monday, January 24, 2005

In yet another example of how the Left doesn't actually believe in democracy, especially when it doesn't support their fascist totalitarian objectives, check out how five Democratic activists are being charged with, well, here's the snip:

Republican Party of Wisconsin (RPW) Chairman Rick Graber issued the following statement today after Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann filed felony charges against five Democrat Party employees who slashed tires on 25 vehicles rented by RPW for get out the vote activities in last November’s elections. Those charged include the sons of U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore and former Milwaukee Mayor Marvin Pratt.

“Make no mistake, this was an act of political sabotage - a coordinated effort by paid Democrat workers to disrupt the political process and prevent Republicans from getting to the polls. It is especially interesting to note that, according to the criminal complaint, those charged made detailed plans to vandalize Republican headquarters and even gave their project a name – ‘Operation Elephant Takeover.’

Think this will be on the CBS Evening News tonight? Think if the parties were reversed it would be?

MILWAUKEE, Jan. 24 -- The sons of a first-term congresswoman and of Milwaukee's former acting mayor were among five Democratic activists charged Monday with slashing the tires of vans rented by Republicans to drive voters and monitors to the polls on Election Day.

Sowande Omokunde, 25, son of Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), and Michael Pratt, 32, son of former Milwaukee acting mayor Marvin Pratt, were among those charged with criminal damage to property, a felony that carries a maximum punishment of 3 1/2 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The activists are accused of flattening the tires on 25 vehicles rented by the state Republican Party to get out the vote and deliver poll watchers Nov. 2.

Also charged were Lewis Caldwell, 28, and Lavelle Mohammad, 35, both from Milwaukee, and Justin J. Howell, 20, of Racine.

Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesman Seth Boffeli said the five were paid employees of the presidential campaign of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) but were not acting on behalf of the campaign or party.

Um....if they weren't working on behalf of the Kerry For King campaign, just who were they slashing those tires for?

Friday, January 14, 2005

Monday is the observance of Martin Luther King's birthday and the banks will be closed and the postal workers will have to go to the range to get their shooting in, but is it a REAL holiday? I don't mean in the sense of Arizona's not observing it and pissing off Public Enemy, but is it a holiday equivalent to Labor Day, Memorial Day or Presidents Day?

I don't think so for one simple reason…

There aren't any MLK Day sales!

Don't tell me it's out of respect or anything like that - it's plain old liberal discrimination that denies King the equal stature with his fellow holiday holders like Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln. In the disingenuous guise of “showing respect” – c'mon liberals don’t really respect the groups they exploit for political gain - the racist liberal establishment is shoving King to the back of the holiday bus!

I have a dream! I have a dream that one day we’ll have portraits of King with talking mouths like Clutch Cargo talking to similar portraits of Biggie and 2Pac as they discuss who’s got the best stereo deals in town.

I have a dream that actors that don't particularly look like King will appear in ads encourging us to check out the great lease deals on Pacificas at Blane Chrysler-Plymouth at the Akron Motor Mall!

I have a dream that one day, black people and white people, Jews and Gentiles, freedom-loving people and the fascist liberals will be able to go down to The Mattress Warehouse on this day and pick up a great deal on a Sealy Posturepedic and save money because delivery is FREE AT LAST, FREE AT LAST, THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, DELIVERY IS FREE AT LAST!!!

So it's been announced that they've been unable to find any WMDs and the pacifist appeasers of the Left are firing up their old, tired cries of "BUSH LIED! KIDS DIED!" in hopes that repeated mantras will hypnotize the public into ignoring reality and with the assistance of the liberal and partisan MSM, they've got a good shot at keeping the Big Lie machine rolling.

In the run-up to the Iraq war, the Left, channeling their spiritual adviser Neville Chamberlain, made all sorts of predictions that tens of thousands of our soldiers would die on the battlefield because Saddam Hussein had chemical weapons and a army tougher than a flabby, soft, evil American forces. When the invasion hit resistance after about 10 days of fighting, the media was cackling gleefully and warming up the Q-word – quagmire – to hang the Viet Nam albatross around Dubya’s neck for opposing their and France’s will.

However, after Baghdad fell in 3 weeks flat, the history revisionists immediately sniped that Dubya had lied about Iraq’s strength because, look at what happened, we ran right thru them. “Dubya LIED, Iraqis DIED!!!” Blah-blah-woof-woof and all the dire predictions from a mere month earlier were tossed down the Memory Hole by the Left.

As the WMD search went on into the Election year, the drumbeat of “BUSH LIED, PEOPLE DIED!” started and lots of books making false accusations of intel being “cooked up” to support a “war for oil, for Halliburton” hit the best-seller charts as the market for liberal fantasy porn was tapped. (It’s always OK when a liberal makes a buck, innit?) John Kerry flipped his flopper about his war vote to head off Howard Dean and in defiance of his record of speeches in 1998 when he, Ted Kennedy, Bill Clinton and Al Gore collectively were saying that Saddam was a threat and that he needed to be dealt with.

So, what had happened in five years? Easy. The Dems lost the White House and obstruction and sabotage became the raison d’etre of that Party. With the Fictitious Documentarian leading the propaganda offensive, Saddam was turned into a saintly and benevolent mensch and Dubya was the Hitler bent on destroying the world. Nice. Untrue, but good for business, especially if your business is lying and obstruction and treason like the Left is.

Anyways, one of Dubya’s greatest mistakes was to allow Clinton CIA chief George Tenet to ride along into his Administration. Part of it was due to the truncated transition period as Al Gore held up the 2000 Election in his futile attempt to steal the race in the courts and part was due to….well, I don’t know and I haven’t seen an explanation that made sense either. Allowing any remnant of that criminal enterprise that was the Clinton Regime to hang around was asking for trouble and 9/11 and the crap WMD intel – remember Tenet’s “it’s a slam dunk” pronouncement? – is the result and the body count; fanned by the treasonous Left for political purposes is the reward. Just ducky.

So, when you hear the Big Lie machine of the Left whirring into action, trying to paint the war as being “based on lies”, remember the facts and be aware there’s a hella difference between lying – which means making stuff up – and being totally wrong about what you thought you knew. Being wrong isn’t lying, but you won’t hear that from the MSM and as CBS has proven, they aren’t gonna let a little thing like the Truth get in the way of their agendas.

Finally, the build-up to the war was conducted over several months and a two-day ultimatum was issued before the shooting started. Saddam had pimped the sanctions process for a decade; had bought off the UN and are alleged allies and could’ve stalled forever, plundering the country and allowing those fine sons of his uninterrupted operation of the rape rooms, torture chambers and mass graves if only he’d allowed the useless UN inspectors back in and played like he was cooperating, but he didn’t.

Why not? Could it be that he was so used to knowing that Clinton would never do anything to protect American interests that he’d been lulled into thinking Dubya was bluffing?

Duh.

Bottom line: Dubya was suckered by trusting people who didn’t have his or the country’s best interests at heart. Look for this to be twisted into the old refrains as the Left mobilizes to hide their seditious motivations and treasonous actions.

Note: This isn’t a defense of Dubya’s being a patsy of the Left; just a call that lies that he lied will be smacked down.

In a petulant display of being unable to MOVE ON, capitalist liberals - there's an oxymoron for ya! - have copped the fund-raising rubber band fad initially popularized by those yellow LIVESTRONG bands that are raising funds to buy Lance Armstrong a replacement testicle with Anti-Bush Bracelets [that] Say, 'Count Me Blue', so that the crybabies can express their inability to withstand defeat without actually opening their traps.

This woman plans on giving PART of her profits - let's see a non-liberal get away with less that 100% tithing - to UNICEF, a division of that corrupt organization of thugs and dictators on the East River, which means that starving children won't get squat, but some UN thief will dine at Ruth's Chris steakhouse.

In an act a familial equal-time, her father is selling red bands to show support for Dubya. of course, if you were a red rubber band, you're just marking yourself as a target for violence from these sore losers like occured before the Election with vandalism against campaign offices.

First comes the crime: Dan Rather's late hit on President Bush's Air National Guard service, featuring what were almost immediately revealed to be forged documents.

Then comes the coverup: 12 days of CBS stonewalling, with Dan Rather using his evening news platform to (a) call his critics "partisan political operatives," (b) claim falsely that the documents were authenticated by experts, and (c) claim that he had "solid sources," which turned out to be a rabid anti-Bush partisan with a history of, shall we say, prolific storytelling.

Now comes the twist: The independent investigation -- clueless, uncomprehending and in its own innocent way disgraceful -- pretends that this fiasco was in no way politically motivated.

CBS had been pursuing the story for five years. Five years! The Manhattan Project took three. Five years for a minor episode in a 30-year-old byway in the life of the president? This story had been vetted not only in two Texas gubernatorial races but twice more by the national media, once in 2000 and then yet again earlier in 2004 when Michael Moore's "deserter" charge and Terry McAuliffe's "AWOL" charge touched off a media frenzy that culminated in a Newsweek cover.

Did Mapes and Rather devote a fraction of the resources they gave this story to a real scandal, such as the oil-for-food scandal at the United Nations, or contrary partisan political charges, such as those brought by the Swift boat vets against John Kerry? On the United Nations, no interest. On Kerry, what CBS did do was ad hominem investigative stories on the Swift boat veterans themselves, rather than an examination of the charges. Do you perceive a direction to these inclinations?

Now comes the National Guard story, the most blindingly partisan bungle in recent journalistic history, and the august investigative panel, CBS News and most of the mainstream media do not have a clue. The bungle is attributed to haste and sloppiness. Haste, yes. To get the story out in time to damage, perhaps fatally, the president's chances of reelection.

This is not an isolated case. In fact the case is a perfect illustration of an utterly commonplace phenomenon: the mainstream media's obliviousness to its own liberal bias.

I do not attribute this to bad faith. I attribute it to (as Marx would say) false consciousness -- contracted by living in the liberal media cocoons of New York, Washington and Los Angeles, in which any other worldview is simply and truly inconceivable. This myopia was most perfectly captured by Pauline Kael's famous remark after Nixon's 1972 landslide: "I don't know how Richard Nixon could have won. I don't know anybody who voted for him."

Little Green Footballs reports that the PDF file of the Rathergate Report has been altered to prevent copying-and-pasting, thus continuing their ham-handed assault of the Truth.

Note to CBS: You got busted. You got busted so bad that the whitewashed, half-assed and incomplete Report showed what lying, conspiratorial hacks you are (if you read between the scrubbed lines) - yet you still have to try and prevent the spread of the facts?

Still, the notion of a neutral, non-partisan mainstream press was, to me at least, worth holding onto. Now it's pretty much dead, at least as the public sees things. The seeds of its demise were sown with the best of intentions in the late 1960s, when the AMMP was founded in good measure (and ironically enough) by CBS. Old folks may remember the moment: Walter Cronkite stepped from behind the podium of presumed objectivity to become an outright foe of the war in Vietnam. Later, he and CBS's star White House reporter, Dan Rather, went to painstaking lengths to make Watergate understandable to viewers, which helped seal Richard Nixon's fate as the first president to resign.

The crusades of Vietnam and Watergate seemed like a good idea at the time, even a noble one, not only to the press but perhaps to a majority of Americans. The problem was that, once the AMMP declared its existence by taking sides, there was no going back. A party was born.

It was not accident that the birth coincided with an identity crisis in the Democratic Party. The ideological energy of the New Deal had faded; Vietnam and various social revolutions of the ’60s were tearing it apart. Into the vacuum came the AMMP, which became the new forum for choosing Democratic candidates. A "reform" movement opened up the nominating process, taking it out of the smoke-filled backrooms and onto television and into the newsrooms. The key to winning the nomination and, occasionally, the presidency, became expertise at riding the media wave. McGovern did it, Gary Hart almost did (until he fell off his surfboard); Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton rode it all the way.

In this situation, the last thing the AMMP needed was to aim wildly at the president — and not only miss, but be seen as having a political motivation in attacking in the first place. Were Dan Rather and Mary Mapes after the truth or victory when they broadcast their egregiously sloppy story about Bush's National Guard Service? The moment it made air it began to fall apart, and eventually was shredded by factions within the AMMP itself, conservative national outlets and by the new opposition party that is emerging: The Blogger Nation. It's hard to know now who, if anyone, in the "media" has any credibility.

Monday, January 10, 2005

That's what John Fund is wondering as bloggers have been able to keep the pressure on about the shenanigans that allowed the Dem to steal the election by using bogus ballots and multiple count until democracy was bent to the Dems will.

Somehow I don't recall Barbara Boxer weeping over this real theft like she did for the bogus sour grapes about Ohio last week. Shouldn't the Democratic Party just change its name to something more accurate, like the "Supreme Soviet"?
Much of the evidence uncovered on King County's flouting of election laws first appeared on Soundpolitics.com, a blog run by computer consultant Stefan Sharkansky. A former liberal who worked for Michael Dukakis in 1988, Mr. Sharkansky calls himself a "9/11 conservative mugged by reality." He uses his knowledge of statistics and probability to illustrate how unlikely some of the reported vote count changes are. He also uncovered the fact that in Precinct 1823 in downtown Seattle, 527, or 70%, of the 763 registered voters used 500 Fourth Avenue--the King County administration building--as their residential address. A full 61% of the precinct's voters only registered in the last year, and nearly all of them "live" at 500 Fourth Avenue. By contrast, only 13% of all of King County voters registered in 2004.

Of course, the Left is doing the Happy Dance over this and published Dubya hater David Corn has a column talking about how Williams slipped and used the "everybody does it" defense for a moment and wants to know what other CONSERVATIVES may be getting paid off, though he seems curiously (*cough*) disinterested in any Left Wing hacks getting paid off. Why would that be?

The 234-page report on SeeBS's coordinated smear attempt has dropped with three CBS execs being forced to resign and producer/character assassin Mary Mapes getting the axe - hopefully ending her career in respectible *cough* news, though Air America and the NY Times are still options, I guess.

However, the blogosphere is already calling this a "whitewash" because two crucial details are left unpunished:

1. The forged documents are never outright called fake, but rather they're likely to be fake. (And Pamela Anderson's boobs are possibly real, too!)

B. The blame is being placed on competitve pressures - a rush to be first with the story - and not on the blatant agenda of Mapes and Rather and their desire to defame the guy they wanted out of office.

Friday, January 07, 2005

I've been remiss in posting about the never-ending bigotry and condescending racism of liberals. As part of their "we're better than you are" mindset, they definitely consider themselves above the minorities they exploit thru fear and bribes every four years - hey, if "those people" were so smart, they wouldn't vote their own chains of dependency thru us, would they?"

When Colin Powell (the first black Sec of State) announced he was resigning and was replaced by Condoleeza Rice (who'll be the first black woman SoS), the racist liberal media flooded their pages with cartoons that I thought went out in the 1850s, depicting her as a rag-head Prissy who "don't know nothing 'bout no foreign policy" - a vile stereotype those same liberals would NEVER let go by if it was a liberal black getting defamed by, say, Fox News Channel.

USA Today broke the story that noted (heck, almost only) black conservative Armstrong Williams was paid $240,000 to talk up the stupid No Child Left Behind Act which is so flabberghastingly stupid, I don't even need to explain why it's wrong. What blows my mind is that everyone was so naive/clueless/braindead as to think that this was A-OK on the first place and that the MSM wouldn't crucify them for it in the second. This is why the GOP is the Stupid Party and I'm glad I didn't vote for these clowns.

Well, a typical reaction to this sad story of woe is found in the thoroughly disgusting Steve Gilliard's News Blog : Massa, I sure do likes No Child Left Behind, which I don't recommend you read on a full stomach. Since a counter to racism is to cast disinfecting sunshine into its greasy corners, I guess it's instructive to see how liberals REALLY treat those "uppity" ones who dare escape their Democratic masters. Hold your nose.....

Of course it's totally unethical and illegal, but hey, he's already sold his soul to massa, why not sell it some more. Massa George wanted him to do somethin' so he did it. And got paid well for it.

On top of Clarence Thoams begging his white patrons for money, this ought to expose the character of the negro conservative. They have no soul and no morals. They can be bought by their white overlords because they apsire to their status, but think themselves unworthy to be treated as the same. Now, I'll freely admit both Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson have used their position to gain personally. But this kind of craven greed is a feature of the negro conservative. He shuffles and bucks along for his master, losing his soul and dignity in the process.

He has no ethics to begin with, the show horse for a bunch of people who think he's lesser than them. So why wouldn't he use his position to enrich himself and hide his illegal arrangement with his white masters. He's already sold his dignity and self-respect. Why not sell his reputation as well. Williams is already an embarassment to black people. This just furthers the shame he brings.

Ugh. If that's not enough, read the Comments for more KKK-DNC hate speech.

Rhetorical question: If the problem with black conservatives is that they sell their dignity to the white masters, how is that different from the liberal welfare pushers who condemn poor blacks to an enternity of dependency in order secure their political lifestyles.

Most younger people only know of Susan Sontag in the context of Kevin Costner's "What I Believe" monologue in "Bull Durham", but she passed away this week and it's been interesting to see the reaction to the papering over of Sontag's sexual orientation, especially considering her longtime companion was the ace uber-photographer Annie Leibowitz. Andrew Sullivan has had several bits about the pros and cons of her being closeted, so check those out (link at right), but the first piece I came across was by Patrick Moore, author of "Beyond Shame: Reclaiming the Abandoned History of Radical Gay Sexuality" called Susan Sontag and a Case of Curious Silence. A taste:

It seems that editors at what are, arguably, the nation's most respected (and liberal) newspapers believe that one personal detail cannot be mentioned in even the most complete biographies — being a lesbian.

In a 1995 New Yorker profile, Sontag outed herself as bisexual, familiar code for "gay." Yet she remained quasi-closeted, speaking to interviewers in detail about her ex-husband without mentioning her long liaisons with some of America's most fascinating female artists.

Some will ask why revealing Sontag's sexuality is relevant. As Charles McGrath wrote in his appreciation of Sontag in the New York Times, "Part of her appeal was her own glamour — the black outfits, the sultry voice, the trademark white stripe parting her long dark hair." Sontag was well aware of herself as a sexual being and used her image to transform herself from just another intellectual into a cultural icon. She may well have felt that her true sexuality would limit her impact in the male-dominated intellectual elite, while an omnisexual charisma opened doors.

More important, though, Sontag's lesbian relationships surely affected her work and our understanding of it. Two of Sontag's most famous essays dealt with issues associated with homosexuality: "Notes on Camp" and "AIDS and Its Metaphors."

The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times found ample room to discuss Sontag's cancer and subsequent mastectomy, which were not seen as lurid details but as necessary information in understanding the work of the author of "Illness as Metaphor." The papers also included extensive discussions of Sontag's schooling, her early family life, how she met her ex-husband, even her thoughts on driving in Los Angeles. However, her relationships with women and how they shaped her thoughts on gay culture and the larger world of outsiders and outlaws (a Sontag fascination) were omitted.

There is, of course, a larger issue here: Continued silence about lesbians in American culture amounts to bias. Gay men seem to have settled into the role of finger-snapping designer/decorator/entertainers in the mass media. Meanwhile, most lesbians who achieve widespread fame — Ellen DeGeneres, Melissa Etheridge and Rosie O'Donnell — have to remain in the closet until they have gained enough power to weather the coming-out storm. This model victimizes those who are out and proud from the very beginning.

The obituaries, remembrances and appreciations in New York and Los Angeles do anything but honor Sontag. They form a record that is, at best, incomplete and, at worst, knowingly false. But don't look for corrections, clarifications or apologies.

The New York writer and activist Sarah Schulman has been, ironically, described as "the lesbian Susan Sontag." Schulman told me recently that Sontag "never applied her massive intellectual gifts toward understanding her own condition as a lesbian, because to do so publicly would have subjected her to marginalization and dismissal."

Be sure to go read it all and definitely check out the pros and cons of the closet linked by Sullivan.

Details are here in New Judiciary Committee chairman Specter lets critics talk more, questions Patriot Act, but all that needs to be said is that pushover vote-whore Prez Dubya and the spineless GOP can just eat a d*ck over their collusion and acquiescence with the back-stabbing RINO from Pennsylvania - a state that went for Kerry despite Team Dubya f*cking over the real conservative GOP Senatorial candidate in favor of this liberal joke and now he's showing his true left stripes.

It's not like this should've been a surprise to anyone with even a passing knowledge of Specter's ways, but here we go - watching their self-serving double-dealing agenda stifle freedom and safety. Nice going, blackheads.

The contrast could not have been clearer. The very day President G.W. Bush reached out to Democrat Bill Clinton and recruited his father, Republican G. H. W. Bush, to generate private tsunami-relief donations, Osama bin Laden's comrades detonated three car bombs in Baghdad, killing 16 Iraqi cops and soldiers toiling to rebuild their country. Once again, "the Great Satan" rescues endangered Muslims while Islamic zealots blew their co-religionists to bits. As the south Asian recovery unfolds, American public diplomacy should highlight this comparison to Muslims worldwide.

Countless Muslims were battered on "Black Sunday." Indonesia, Earth's most populous Islamic nation, was lashed hardest with 94,200 fatalities by Wednesday. Sri Lanka and India, both with significant Muslim minorities, have lost 30,240 and 9,675 people so far.

These and other nations have begun to see America's $350 million in government relief. At least $190 million in private assistance is en route, from multimillion-dollar corporate contributions to double-digit sums gleaned from piggy banks and church-collection plates. Catholic Relief Services witnessed such an outpouring of on-line gifts that its overwhelmed webpage crashed for 36 hours.

At an estimated $4 million daily, the Pentagon has mobilized Operation Unified Assistance, its largest Asian military operation since Saigon fell to Communism. By Wednesday, 13,435 U.S. GIs had used 21 vessels, 41 airplanes, and 50 helicopters to deliver 305 tons of supplies. U.S. warships desalinate water for the parched. There is much more help on the way.

All this from a nation that our Islamofascist enemies claim is committed to vanquishing their Muslim brethren.

America and the civilized world, the "infidels" in Islamofascism's crosshairs, are locked in a death match with this toxic ideology and its enthusiasts. Winning this struggle involves swaying rank-and-file Muslims around the world, many of whom call south Asia home.

They also should observe that this matches America's record of aiding at-risk Muslims. The U.S. saved Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo, for instance, and donated $2.5 billion in development assistance to the Middle East and northern Africa in 2003 alone, according to the Paris-basedOrganization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

We also should compare our generosity to the silence and stinginess of our foes. To date, Osama bin Laden has yet to offer a public word of sympathy to the hundreds of thousands of Muslims this calamity has killed, maimed, and dispossessed. The reclusive billionaire apparently has shared none of his wealth with the Muslims he claims to cherish. He has not even publicly invited fellow Muslims to open their wallets to aid those in, say, Banda Aceh, the largely Islamic Sumatran city erased like a misspelled word just 20 minutes after a 9-magnitude earthquake as ferocious as 10,000 Nagasakis.

While $350 million in government help now makes America the fourth largest donor-nation (behind Australia's $810 million, Germany's $680 million, and Japan's $500 million), no Muslim country rated among the top 10 benefactors. Before pledging $30 million Tuesday, 19th-ranked Saudi Arabia offered just $10 million. Sandra Bullock, an actress bereft of mineral resources, somehow gave the Red Cross $1 million

Even worse, as the Middle East Media Research Institute reports, a Saudi cleric blamed infidel tourists for the tsunami. "It happened at Christmas when fornicators and corrupt people from all over the world come to commit fornication and sexual perversion," professor Sheik Fawzan al-Fawzan of al-Imam University told Saudi Arabia's al-Majd TV December 31. So why, professor, does Buddhist Bangkok's notorious red light district still thrive while so much of devoutly Muslim Sumatra was swept to sea?

Meanwhile, legislator Walid Tabtabai wrote in Kuwait's Al Watan daily that the deadly waves were "a test for believers and punishment for the unjust." Radical Islamic commentator Abu Ziyaad called this catastrophe "a warning from Allah" to those who "delay and neglect prayers...indulge in free mixing...and listen to music and songs." So why, Walid, didn't Allah simply level Las Vegas?

"We'd be doing it regardless of religion," Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters in Jakarta Tuesday while surveying the ravaged region with President Bush's brother, Governor Jeb Bush (R., Fla.). Providing aid "does give the Muslim world and the rest of the world an opportunity to see American generosity, American values in action — that we care about every individual and the dignity of every individual."

America leads this massive mission of mercy because it is the right thing to do. That it benefits many Muslims who Islamofascists hope to infuse with hate is even more reason for us to show them our love.

Next time you hear Michael Moore waxing rhapsodic about his beloved "Minutemen" who blew up nine American soldiers yesterday (and will kill as many more as they can while we play "nice guy/sitting duck") or some corrupt U.N. official whom a President Kerry would've sucked-off daily bitch about American stinginess, ask them (and yourselves) a simple question:

Who's TALKING about the problem and who's DOING something to help?

Also, how much have piggish moneybags Moore and George Soros donated to tsunami aid. The Fictitious Docmentarian has a couple hundred million bucks on his Ponderosa EZ-Pay card and Soros certainly racks it up while bankrupting banks with his currency manipulation schemes - you know, the way Grandpa made his first $1000 - so you'd think they'd show some largese leadership.

Yeah, right.

If anyone can cite a contribution from these bastards, I'd appreciate it. Thank you.

Aka "24", one of the few TV shows I watch religiously - actually a bad metaphor cuz I grudgingly drag myself to Church only a couple times a year - and the only one that videotaping is not an option. The party kicks off Sunday, Jan. 9th from 9-11 EST and the very next night, they're running another two hours. SWEET!!!

Of course, you're prolly thinking, "What's the right-wingnut point of this, Dirk?" Well, there actually is a bit of a news angle and it goes a little something like this....HIT IT!

In a item at the Broadcasting & Cable site that's no longer available without a subscription, a Muslim group, The Council on American-Islamic Relations, got a look at the 24-minute sampler DVD that came in Entertainment Weekly and started whining about how “They are taking everyday American Muslim families and making them suspects. They’re making it seem like families are co-conspirators in this terrorist plot." In another scene, she says, a terrorist is shown coming out of a mosque. The way the episode depicts Muslims creates an atmosphere in which many Americans look at all Muslims as suspects in the war on terror, she adds. “It’s very dangerous and very disturbing.”

Boo-friggedy-hoo, but, as pointed out by star Keifer Sutherland on tonight's Charlie Rose show, there ARE people and groups around the world that hate America as much as your typical American university indoctrination technician (i.e. college professor.)

In response to this news on a BBS I frequent, I posted the following:

Let's get this straight, because bad guy characters are shown as being Muslims, that means they're saying all Muslims are being called terrorists? Uh, right. (Every hear of a little town called Madrid?)

Political correctness bullsh*t like this cripples art and makes us weaker as a nation. Between the "Kill me first" dress code for air marshalls (see Dirkworld for more on this) and the rules against searching too many Arab men for fear of racial profiling accusations being made, we're being forced to be insecure in order to protect the po' widdle feelings of a religious group whose peaceful moderates certainly keep a low profile.

Should Fox force the show be reshot with a more acceptable, politically correct threat? How about Nazis or Catholic priests? Everyone hates them, so let's make them the bad guys, cuz that's the way things really are nowadays, right? Lots of Nazis and priests blowing themselves up, yes? (Wasn't it on CNN?)

Sorry, but the whole reason people enjoy the JACK BAUER POWER HOUR is EXACTLY because Jack and Palmer didn't pussy-foot around, worrying what the world and press were gonna whine about while they were torturing suspects to prevent L.A. from being nuked.

In a time of timid so-called leaders fumbling national security because of fear of the MSM, we watch "24" to get that nice fantasy of a government that actual puts AMERICA first.

Objection overruled! Plaintiff is instructed to watch "Lost" for its inclusion of the only member of Saddam's Republican Guard who apparently never hurt a fly.

CASE DISMISSED!!!

Another forum member - a generally alright bloke whom I've occasionally scuffled with over movies (who doesn't?) - posted this in reply:

Dirk I agree 100%. I've been saying that this show is a catharsis for the American audience. While the US military cannot find Bin Laden, we have a counter-terrorist agent who will stop at nothing to protect the lives of innocent Americans.

After updating the forum about the Charlie Rose shot (to alert Left Coasters who may be interested), I closed with...

Ironic that on a day where we saw one American political party carry the water for and defend the terrorists who want to kill their constituents out of political spite, we get a glimpse of the world mentioned above where protecting the public is Job One.

Too bad it's just a fantasy.

If you've never watched "24", for gawds sake, START WATCHING NOW!!! You can thank me later.

The Democrats are up to their usual racist tricks as they try to squash the nomination of Judge Alberto Gonzales for the crime of not swearing the appropriate fealty to the Left. Of course, they aren't saying THAT, but instead are trying to use the mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib as a cudgel to blame him, Dubya and Evil America in general for not being nice enough to those nice young men who are doing their political bidding by slaughtering our soldiers. (When they aren't kidnapping and beheading civilians, that is.)

Make no mistake about it - the Democratic Party is ideologically identical to Al Queda because they share the same hatred of America and the desire to see it laid low and submissive to our enemies. This is why, despite all of Dubya's weaknesses and failings, we're a lucky country that the Feckless Crapweasel didn't win. (Whew.)

So many readers have made variations of this point, many, many from personal experience:

After I was captured, my hands were tied behind my back and I was struck repeatedly in the face with an open hand. After enduring the beating I was thrown on the water board, where under questioning the enemy would drown you till the verge of losing consciousness, only to revive you and start all over again. Then a black bag was secured around my head and throat which made it difficult to breathe. I was confined to a three by four foot tiger cage with a coffee can for a toilet. Loud music blared from speakers in the compound and I was repeatedly dragged from my cage for more beatings and interrogation. At night when it was freezing the guards would pour cold water on me. I was deprived of any food for five straight days.

Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? Well that is only part of what EVERY U.S. Navy and Air Force pilot and flight crew goes through in survival school. The Army does it for their special forces guys as well. We do this to our own people for training but we can't do it to terrorists?
Incredible.

There is a story to be told here: a story about how CBS coordinated its attack on President Bush with the Democratic National Committee; a story about how fake documents were put into the hands of a mentally ill, obsessively anti-Bush crank named Bill Burkett; a story about how Burkett (if he can be believed) not only got the documents into the hands of 60 Minutes, but also into the hands of the Kerry campaign, via Max Cleland; a story about how left-wing CBS producer Mary Mapes pursued the Bush National Guard "story" for five years, beginning when he was Governor of Texas, without finding anything worth reporting until the fake documents came along; a story about how 60 Minutes was warned that the documents appeared to be fakes, but published them anyway; a story about how CBS relied on interviews with people who had neither met President Bush nor seen the documents, like Robert Strong, but carefully avoided talking to the key witnesses who actually had knowledge of relevant events, like Gen. "Buck" Staudt. Whom, by the way, they carelessly slandered in their broadcast.

But I doubt whether Thornburgh and Boccardi will tell that story. To conduct this investigation, you needed an investigator. An old-fashioned investigator who would go to Texas, track down Bill Burkett, and persuade him to talk. Who would immerse himself in the corrupt politics of Travis County, Texas, and pursue leads on who created the forgeries. Who would demand to see Mary Mapes' telephone records for the last two years, and track down every number she called. Who would make witnesses like Max Cleland either answer questions, or go on record as refusing to talk. Who would, in short, investigate.

CBS didn't employ an investigator. They employed a couple of distinguished 70-year-old gentlemen: exactly the wrong sort of people. Maybe Thornburgh and Boccardi had the sense to hire investigators, but I doubt it. My guess is that their "investigation" consisted essentially of interviewing CBS employees. At one point, I saw a news item where they proudly announced that they had talked to 36 CBS employees. Wow. What they needed to do was forget about CBS for a while, and go to Texas. If they only talked to CBS people, they would inevitably come away with the impression that 60 Minutes was well-intentioned but regrettably failed to be sufficiently critical of the documents' authenticity, and therefore fell for a possible hoax.

The fundamental question here is whether CBS was the victim of a hoax, or the perpetrator of a hoax. It has been our view for a long time that Rather and his colleagues were perpetrators, not victims, in part because the documents were such obvious fakes that it strains credulity to suppose that they were actually fooled. When you read the Thornburgy/Boccardi report, keep that question constantly in mind: victim, or perpetrator?

There are lots of problems with CBS's effort to portray itself as the victim of a hoax, but perhaps the most intractable is Dan Rather's personal vouching for the documents. Trust me, he said to America. I know they're authentic. They came from an unimpeachable source. That takes CBS out of the category of victim, and into the category of perpetrator.

Thursday, January 06, 2005

Isn't it nice that immigrants are threatened for not hating their adopted country with the black fury of the locals? This must've been a liberal arts college. ([rim shot] I'm here all week - try the veal!)

Seriously, check out Ahmad Al-Qloushi's story over at FrontPage Magazine about what happened when he disagreed with the professor's thesis that the Constitution was some sort of evil document and wrote this essay with a typical reaction from your typical college elitist. Here's the snips:

I am a 17-year-old Kuwaiti Arab Muslim and a college freshman studying in the USA. I was three years of age when Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990...The Americans...came in to liberate us and asked for nothing in return. I love this country for the freedom it provides and for rescuing Kuwait’s liberty in the first Gulf War. 12 Years later, America once again has selflessly protected my country and my people by removing Saddam Hussein.

I arrived in the United States for the first time 5 months ago with tremendous enthusiasm to study the political institutions and history of this extraordinary country.

I enrolled in Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, California and immediately registered for “Introduction to American Government and Politics." I was shocked by my Professor’s singularly one-sided presentation. Week after week, I encountered a lack of intellectual and political diversity that I would have more commonly expected to have heard on the streets of pre-liberation Iraq. In this particular class I heard only one consistent refrain: America is bad.

When I read the assignment I remembered back to my high school in Kuwait. Many of my teachers were Palestinian; they hated America, they hated my worldview, and they did their best to brainwash me. I did not leave my country and my family to come to the United States to receive further brainwashing. I disagreed completely with Dye and Zeigler’s thesis. I wrote an essay defending America’s Founding Fathers and upholding the US constitution as a pioneering document, which has contributed to extraordinary freedoms in America and other corners of the world - including my corner, the Middle East.

Professor Woolcock didn’t grade my essay. Instead he told me to come to see him in his office the following morning. I was surprised the next morning when instead of giving me a grade, Professor Woolcock verbally attacked me and my essay. He told me, “Your views are irrational.” He called me naïve for believing in the greatness of this country, and told me "America is not God's gift to the world." Then he upped the stakes and said "You need regular psychotherapy." Apparently, if you are an Arab Muslim who loves America you must be deranged. Professor Woolcock went as far as to threaten me by stating that he would visit the Dean of International Admissions (who has the power to take away student visas) to make sure I received regular psychological treatment.

This scared me. I didn’t want to be deported for having written a pro-American essay, so as soon as I left his office I made an appointment with the school psychologist. She let me go with a comment that I don’t need regular therapy. As I left her office, I couldn’t help thinking that even my Palestinian high school teachers had never tried to silence me or put me in therapy.

I have since learned that mine is not an isolated case. Many students in American universities are being indoctrinated and silenced by biased professors who hate America. America saved my life and the lives of my family. How can I not speak out?

The local media picked up the story of what happened to me. Professor Woolcock then filed a school grievance accusing me, under section 5 of Foothill’s grievance code, of an “act or threat of intimidation or general harassment.” If you are confused by this, so was I. Foothill’s Dean of Student Affairs, Don Dorsey, would not let me see the grievance as filed but he summarized it for me by saying, "Professor Woolcock feels harassed by your having mentioned his name to the media."

What's so worrisome about this brutal brainwashing attempt is how many kids are either blindly accepting this venom or are too cowed to speak out. Of course, "making an example" out of anyone who dares oppose the ruling elite of academe is part and parcel of their control tactics to suppress dissent.

Wednesday, January 05, 2005

I saw this on the news last night but didn't get a chance to dig up the citations - you see, bloggers link to their sources, the MSM says "trust us" and gets snippy when pressed and caught - but at MSNBC - Tsunami relief pledges soar past $3 billion, there is a chart in the middle listing the pledges of the various countries.

Last night, Japan was #1 with $500 million, but Oz and Home o' the Nazis have stepped up with $810 mil. and $674 mil., respectively. (Looks like Dubya's gonna have to bid up our Texas Hold 'Em stake.) But what caught my ear was how incredibly stingy the contributions from oil-rich Arab countries has been in helping their fellow Muslims in need. Dig it:

That's $77 million dollars, merely a FIFTH of what Great Satan AmeriKKKa (Ice Cube spelling) has ponied up so far, but five times more than the stingy consumers at Amazon have coughed up. One of the reasons given is that they're afraid that some of the money may fall into the hands of infidels.

That's right - their own people can suffer, lest someone get his infidel hands on the money before they get around to blowing them up. Also, the Egyptian papers have been speculating that American and Indian nuclear testing may be to blame (Cool! Hindu bashing, too!) and these supposedly educated folks are believing it like they believe 9/11 was caused by Jewish suicide pilots. Of course, the environmentalist whackos blamed the tsunamis on global warming so it's not so much a religious issue as a common "hate America" ideology.

And the reasons why Islam isn't fit for these times just keep coming. Too bad. So sad.

Didn't get around to this last night, but those plagarists over at Powerline - ;) - posted a story about a speech given by English author Melanie Phillips entitled "The Reporting of Iraq and Israel: An Abuse of Media Power." Read the Powerline article for the tease and format.

Of course for those too busy to read anything that may challenge their Michael Moore-programmed worldview, here's a snippet to quickly ignore:

Britain is gripped by an unprecedented degree of irrationality, prejudice and hysteria over the issues of Iraq, the terrorist jihad and Israel. All three are intimately linked; all three, however, are thought by public opinion to be linked in precisely the wrong way. This is because all three have been systematically misreported, distorted and misrepresented through a lethal combination of profound ignorance, political malice and ancient prejudices.

This systematic abuse by the media is having a devastating impact in weakening the ability of the west to defend itself against the unprecedented mortal threat that it faces from the Islamic jihad. People cannot and will not fight if they don’t understand the nature or gravity of the threat that they face, so much so that they vilify their own leaders while sanitising those who would harm them.

The outcome is a society which no longer understands how to distinguish truth from lies, no longer understands or accepts the desirability of objectivity and no longer is capable of rational debate based on facts and logic. Instead, all evidence is filtered through prism of prior political prejudice and emotion to which it is wrenched to fit. It replaces evidence by propaganda, rationality by gullibility.

And it is perhaps the single greatest incitement to terror. Terrorism is designed to achieve maximum publicity and to manipulate public revulsion so that pressure is put on the leaders of the democracies to surrender. It cannot be said too often that what drives al Qaeda is not the exercise of disproportionate force by the west but the perception of its weakness and incapacity or unwillingness to fight in its own defence. But even al Qaeda must surely have been taken aback by the craven willingness of the British media to fall into line by abusing and persecuting their own leaders at a time of war. These terrorists know that the more barbaric their acts, the more hysteria and pressure the British media will direct at Blair and Bush. So al Qaeda has every incentive to ratchet up the atrocities. - Hmmm, does that sound familiar? Why yes it does! - That’s why the hostage Kenneth Bigley was videoed sobbing for his life in a cage; and the media duly do what the terrorists want and put it on their front pages and news bulletins, and the pressure on Blair to split from America becomes more and more intolerable.

The appalling result of all this is that, if a terrorist outrage in London were to claim the lives of hundreds or thousands of people, the reaction of many Britons might not be a revival of the spirit of the Blitz and an iron determination to defeat fascism and tyranny. It might be instead to turn on Tony Blair and blame him directly for bringing about the slaughter. And that, of course, is precisely what makes such a terrible outcome more likely. There can be little doubt that al Qaeda, such a shrewd judge of western decadence and the differences in moral fibre between the countries of the west, will have noted the fact that in Britain, the worse the terrorist outrage that is committed, the more the public will turn on Tony Blair. Every single defeatist, distorted or dishonest article about Iraq, Israel and the war on terror makes another barbaric atrocity more likely.

It is this weakness and moral confusion that comprise the great goal of terrorist strategy; it is this that has characterised the west’s response to Islamic terror for many decades; it is this that has brought us to where we are today. In the war that has been declared upon the free world, the western media’s abuse of power is perhaps the most lethal weapon of all.

While this is written from the British viewpoint, it's just as applicable here in America and if you think Dubya is the cause of all the world's problems, give your programmed ass a gold star and give Moby a big kiss on the lips and the back of the neck!

Well, dear friends, we're now into the tenth day of the tsunami crisis and in this battered corner of Asia, the UN is nowhere to be seen -- unless you count at meetings, in five-star hotels, and holding press conferences.

Aussies and Yanks continue to carry the overwhelming bulk of the burden,

The UN continues to send its best product, bureaucrats.

Most interesting to me was this memo written by Dutch diplomats and circulated at an EU meeting in Indonesia:

The US military has arrived and is clearly establishing its presence everywhere in Banda Aceh. They completely have taken over the military hospital, which was a mess until yesterday but is now completely up and running. They brought big stocks of medicines, materials for the operation room, teams of doctors, water and food. Most of the patients who were lying in the hospital untreated for a week have undergone medical treatment by the US teams by this afternoon. US military have unloaded lots of heavy vehicles and organize the logistics with Indonesian military near the airport. A big camp is being set up at a major square in the town. Huge generators are ready to provide electricity. US helicopters fly to places which haven't been reached for the whole week and drop food. The impression it makes on the people is also highly positive; finally something happens in the city of Banda Aceh and finally it seems some people are in control and are doing something. No talking but action. European countries are until now invisible on the ground.

The UN not doing anything? No surprise to anyone not watching CBS for news. So, when are we getting that East River view real estate back?

Howard Kurtz has a roundup of "Tsunami Politics" in this morning's Washington Post. Echoing various newspapers from which he quotes, Kurtz dutifully recites the criticism that President Bush was "slow" to react to the Indian Ocean disaster:

Like it or not, Bush fostered the impression that he was painfully slow to react to the post-Christmas disaster while at the ranch. Three full days with no appearance before the cameras? What else did he have to do that was more important?

Oh, I don't know. I supposed he could have ordered an aircraft carrier and a Marine strike group to the disaster scene. That would be more important than giving a useless press conference, which would have done nothing at all to help anyone. These press complaints are typical of the elevation of symbolism over substance that permeates newspaper coverage of many issues.

There is, of course, a subtext to press complaints that President Bush was slow to give a press conference. As Kurtz notes, the Los Angeles Times, one of the country's most left-wing newspapers, made the subtext explicit:

President Bush's initial, halting response to the Indian Ocean tsunami catastrophe, followed within days by strong expressions of concern and decisive action, spotlighted a governing style that sometimes finds its stride only after stumbling at the gate. This seems especially true when Bush is confronted with a cataclysmic event and must improvise quickly -- as with the Dec. 26 tsunami or the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. . . .

Michael Moore remains a powerful influence on the Democratic Party.

So, keep reading Dirkworld and *occasionally*, you may actually get ahead of the cutting edge! Neat! :)

(Where's my cable TV news show shot?!? If that Wonkette chippie can get her airhead on air, I demand my 15 seconds!!!!)

Sounds harsh, but until the silent (and may as well be mythical) "peaceful" majority of Muslims step up and crack down on the medieval fascists running amok, I don't think we should be too concerned about their po' widdle feelings (e.g. Abu Graib - guess we shouldn't care about the innocents being beheaded and blown up.)

On the evening news, they showed some proud suicide bomber announcing that he intended to kill Americans and hoped not to harm Iraqis because "Muslim blood is precious." Yeah, right. Why there wasn't more precious Muslim blood flooding the streets of Fallujah back in April when they were hanging mutilated bodies parts from bridges and the Marines were ready to clean out the pit until the spineless politicians put on the brakes in the lame hope that the media would be nice to them. Schmucks.

Also fueling this fed-up feeling is reading the profile of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in the Person (what happened to Man?) of the Year issue of Time. What was surprising amongst Time's usual "Dubya = Evil" content was how they detailed how this monster has been itching for a place to commit jihad against the infidels (he was too late for Afghanistan) somewhere - anywhere - and Iraq is the where du jour, but if he's driven out of Iraq, he'll just go somewhere else to continue his slaughtering ways.

So much for Michael Moore's pretense that the insurgents are "the Minutemen - the Founding Fathers." Memo to Moore: F*ck you, you fat f*cking f*ck!!!!

Of course, the Left is escaping their culpability for the continuing carnage. So supportive of the murder of our soldiers and innocent bystanders - like the woman who worked for CARE there for 30 years - in hopes that the bloodshed would fuel Dubya's defeat, they never condemned the murderous Muslims, but instead blamed Dubya and tried to lay the bodies on his doorstep. Nice. Not.

Well, the Election was over EIGHT WEEKS AGO - and no, Ohio isn't going to get the Washington treatment - but the bodies are still coming because after letting the wolves get a steady diet of blood, it's no surprise that they haven't gone veggie now that there's no political benefit for their deaths. Thanks, Michael. Thanks, Bruce. Assholes.

May as well add liberals to the headline for there is no place for their treasonous ideology in a freedom-loving world. Off to France with the lot of you!

Claims of media bias were a major theme during this past election year - from Dan Rather's doctored documents questioning Bush's military service to a convention of minority journalists loudly cheering Kerry when he addressed them in August. But conservatives who want proof of their longstanding claims that the mainstream media harbor a liberal bias could do worse than ordering the audio recordings of the Cambridge conference that are on sale from its sponsor, Harvard's Nieman Foundation for Journalism.

They would hear laughter and applause from reporters after Mailer said he wished he "was young enough to thrash" Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and scattered applause when he claimed that it was not Jesus but "the devil who speaks to George Bush every night."

Admittedly, some of the attendees were academics, publicists and students, so it's hard to say who was laughing at which remark. But the thousand-member audience was dominated by freelance writers and editors and reporters from nearly every major paper in the country. None of the dozen people who stood up to question Mailer challenged any of his political assertions. And only a few failed to stand and applaud at the end of a speech that had characterized Bush as "lord of the quagmire" in Iraq.

Major news outlets routinely have their reports and credibility questioned nowadays because of perceptions of bias. Just before the election, stories in the New York Times and on CBS stating that tons of explosives were missing in Iraq were loudly dismissed in some quarters with the taunt that these "liberal" outlets were trying to turn voters against Bush. The same held true when the Los Angeles Times reported on Arnold Schwarzenegger's past sexual aggression in the days leading up to California's gubernatorial recall last year.

The level of public distrust evoked by partisan leanings - real or perceived - did not stop the reporters at the Nieman conference from applauding frequent left-leaning sentiments. Although most of the sessions were dedicated to nuts-and-bolts instruction on journalism, such as interviewing techniques and tips on how to create a sense of place, Mailer was far from the only speaker to touch directly on politics. Seymour Hersh, the author and investigative reporter for the New Yorker, gave a talk that equaled Mailer's in its anti-Bush venom.

Straight news outlets have an even tougher job in trying to convince anyone that their reports should be distinguished from such open propaganda efforts when their own reporters willingly reveal their political leanings at a public forum. If mainstream journalists hope to preserve not just the trust but the simple attention of readers and viewers, we have to remember just what, as Hart says, our role in society is.

There's no question that reporters should be questioning Bush's version of the truth and that the profession in general should challenge his administration's bent toward secrecy. But the least we can do, when someone makes a speech either bashing or lauding Bush or any other politician, is to sit on our hands.

Monday, January 03, 2005

Just saw a bit on the local news about a woman that robbed three local drive-thru restaurants recently and they described her as "heavy-set" among other details. This reminded me of a bank robbery item I saw in the newspaper a day or two ago that described the suspect as "6 feet tall, 230 lbs, wearing a beige jacket and dark pants". Helpful info?

Um.....sure, if we lived in a world where everyone is the same color.

How pathetic is it that police blotter reportage is considered sufficient when it - deliberately or carelessly - omits a crucial identifiying detail like the race of the suspect?!? Or are we just supposed to assume that unless otherwise stated, it's a black person?

According to Broadcasting & Cable - Mr. Heyward Goes to Washington:
CBS News president Andrew Heyward, along with Washington bureau chief Janet Leissner, recently met with White House communications director Dan Bartlett, in part to repair chilly relations with the Bush administration.

CBS News’ popularity at the White House—never high to begin with—plunged further in the wake of Dan Rather’s discredited 60 Minutes story on George Bush’s National Guard service.

An incentive for making nice is the impending report from the two-member panel investigating CBS's use of now-infamous documents for the 60 Minutes piece.

Heyward was “working overtime to convince Bartlett that neither CBS News nor Rather had a vendetta against the White House,” our source says, “and from here on out would do everything it could to be fair and balanced.”